The Last Temptation of Christ
Written by Grady Fiorio Original Publishing Date: May 7th, 2025 Rating 4.5/5
Didn't they tell you? I am the saint of blasphemy.
The Last Temptation of Christ
Director Martin Scorsese Runtime 2 Hr 44 Min Format Blu-ray Release Date 1988
Poster by Sam Coyle
Jesus Christ. Son of God, and Son of Man. Two in the same, one on Earth. The human and the divine. But how often do we really ask ourselves what that means? Jesus is often portrayed as God, with a halo around his head, performing miracles and walking on water. Last I checked, I float in the pool and get ripped off on wine prices from the grocery mart. But I’m all man, none of the divine. So what if there were a way that we could see the man behind the God, to not only better understand Jesus but understand ourselves? In 1955, Greek author Nikos Kazantzakis asked himself the same question when he wrote the highly controversial novel, The Last Temptation of Christ. The novel was so controversial, it led to Kazantzakis’s excommunication from the Greek Orthodox Catholic Church. But what, in 506 pages of text, could be considered so controversial that it led to such strong reactions?
The Last Temptation of Christ is a work of historical fiction that reinterprets the final moments of Jesus as he performs miracles, wanders through the desert, and faces one final temptation not included in Scripture. This reinterpretation has Christ cross paths with defiance, rage, lust, desire, and true temptation. He goes through the real spectrum of emotion that you would expect of a man being asked to do an impossible task. The book tells a narrative explicitly not in Scripture, but Kazantzakis isn’t trying to hide it. The opening pages of the novel read: “This book is not a biography, it is the confession of every man who struggles. In publishing it I have fulfilled my duty, the duty of a person who struggled much, was much embittered in his life, and had many hopes. I am certain that every free man who reads this book, so filled as it is with love, will more than ever before, better than ever before, love Christ.” It’s an open letter stating that the writings of this novel are not meant to be taken literally, but rather as an exploration of faith, to reconcile divinity with humanity, in a way that can bring the reader closer to their faith. Despite this, it didn’t stop an outpouring of rage from across the entire Christian spectrum, who found the writings of Kazantzakis’ admitted alternate reality to be blasphemous. In 1983, Martin Scorsese faced a similar uphill battle as he attempted to develop an adaptation of the novel. The project fell through shortly thereafter, as Paramount Pictures got cold feet with both rising controversy and budget. The project was eventually revived in 1987 at Universal Studios with a significantly reduced budget and under the favorite Hollywood trope of “One for them, one for me.” Later, Scorsese directed the much more commercial film, Cape Fear, as a follow-up project at Universal. What followed was not only a difficult film to release but also difficult to make. The film had an incredibly tight schedule, with an even tighter budget, that pushed Scorsese and his crew to the brink. So, after all this controversy, fighting, and struggle, was it worth it? Was the story really a work of blasphemy? To an extent, they were right. The Last Temptation of Christ is blasphemous, because it has the gall to ask, “What does it mean to truly test your faith?”
Let’s find out…
“I'm not going to leave until you speak to me. No signs, no pain, just speak to me in human words. Whatever path you want, I'll take. Love, or the axe, or anything else. Now if you want me to stay here and die, I'll do that too, but you have to tell me.” - Jesus
Before getting too deep into the material, it’s important to analyze my own faith. I was born into Catholicism. I spent 17 years of my life in the Church, with all my education until high school based in private religious studies. I went to the same Catholic school my father, aunts, uncles, cousins, and siblings went to, as a multigenerational Catholic family. I went through most of the major sacraments (significant religious rituals and milestones) up to my confirmation at 16. I grew up in an almost strictly Roman Catholic community, with faith being a deep-rooted part of family, connection, and everyday life. We were a church-every-Sunday kind of family, and as far as anybody was concerned, it was going to stay that way. Ironically, just a year after being confirmed, I left the faith behind. For reasons too long to list here, I had become fed up with the practices and controversies of the Church and Vatican, while also feeling that there were too many theological holes in Scripture for me to feel comfortable calling myself a member of the faith. I was without a religious home for the first time in my life, and to be fully honest, I had never felt better. I constantly wrestled with the confines of my faith, constantly talking with priests, ministers, congregation, and researching online to make sense of all the conflicting theology rattling my brain. When it became too much, and nobody had an answer that could satisfy, I left it behind. I wasn’t going to spend the rest of my life in turmoil, following a religion that could only keep me hanging on by threads during the best of times.
Still yet, I wrestled with the identity that I once held. I’ve always stated that Catholicism is not just a religion but an identity. Once you’re born into it, it’s with you forever. You can leave the faith and become an atheist, but you’ll be a Catholic atheist. It’s a deep-rooted culture and mindset that spans across generations, and is really only something you can fully understand if you are born and raised in it. While I consider myself an agnostic over an atheist, I still hold an undeniably Catholic culture in my bones that is impossible to shake. It comes with guilt, conflict, and the constant wrestle to understand how so much tragedy can be combined with so much beauty. This still Catholic part of me, I’ve never been able to make peace with. Many would say that’s because I need Jesus in my life, but I’d say that when you’re brought up in a strict culture of faith, it’s hard to reconcile your current worldview with one you never chose to have.
Through the comings and goings of the waves of faith in my life, I never lost my fascination with religion. Truly all faiths, but of course, mostly the one I was raised in. I find the story of Jesus to be endlessly compelling, even if I don’t believe that the divine side of it happened. A man tries to bring peace to the world, only to become a threat to power, betrayed by those closest to him, and killed by his government, becoming a martyr for their movement. MLK, JFK, John Lennon, Fred Hampton. Sound familiar? Of course, these stories don’t have any elements of the supernatural or the hand of God at their side, but this only proves to make the story of Jesus even more compelling, with an added layer of responsibility when it comes to knowingly sacrificing himself for a world that wants nothing to do with him. I don’t care what you believe—that’s a good story. But there’s an element that neither the Church nor storytellers have chosen to explore, until Nikos Kazantzakis in 1955. The man within the divine. It’s hard to relate to Jesus because he isn’t flawed. We’re told he faced temptation in the desert, but how can that be real if he was born pure and without sin? I just can’t believe that a man would willingly sacrifice himself without second thought, for a world that would rather see him dead. That’s where The Last Temptation comes in.
SPOILERS for the film and novel from here on out. Trust me, it’s different from the one you know.
“The feeling begins.” - Jesus
The film starts as explosively as it can, with Jesus the carpenter building crosses for the Romans to crucify people on, specifically (and ironically) the one that they will use to kill Lazarus. Jesus’ closest friend in the film, Judas, barges into his workshop and berates him. “You’re a disgrace! Romans can't find anybody to make crosses. Except for you. You do it! You’re worse than them! You’re a Jew killing Jews. You’re a coward! How will you ever pay for your sins?” Jesus then follows a group of Roman guards to take a freshly built cross to a mound, as they crucify Lazarus. The Romans drive the nail into his feet, splattering blood across the face of Jesus. He tosses and turns into the night, living a nightmare as an act of defiance. Why? Because he is scared. “God loves me. I know he loves me. I want him to stop… I want him to hate me. I want him to find somebody else. I want to crucify every one of his messiahs.” This is a Jesus defiant of God, living in fear of the burden he is being asked to carry. The weight of mankind on his shoulders. And what in return? It’s an incredibly provocative image to open with, and not entirely hard to see why Christian audiences reacted so strongly.
The film then goes to explore his complex relationship with Mary Magdalene. It’s often been theorized that Magdalene was a prostitute, and here she is. She’s become resentful of Jesus, as she romantically loves him, but his vow of chastity has prevented him from reciprocating the same desire he feels for her. The relationship between the two is portrayed as much more complex than in Scripture, with an element of back and forth between them always keeping away what is truly in their hearts in the ordinance of duty. It’s a grand recontextualization of what is often portrayed as a close friendship. But in reality, how often does friendship turn into romantic feelings? It’s not sinful to feel romantic love for another person, but when we picture this idea in the mind of Jesus, our minds turn from romance to inevitable sex. Now, it’s sex associated with Jesus, and love becomes blasphemy. Even when it’s the idea of starting a family, raising kids, and living a modest life (something that Jesus explicitly states in the film), we see it as something to be ashamed of. But is it more human to love, or to deny one’s feelings and live a stoic life where there is no challenge, only predestination? These are the ideas that the narrative and this new image of Jesus present to us. For Catholics especially, there are strong taboos around sex and sexuality. It’s meant to be done within the bonds of marriage, for the explicit purpose of procreation, and the use of birth control is banned. God even smote a guy for pulling out and “spilling his seed” (Genesis 38:8-10). This conflict between the heart and dogmatic beliefs turns what are normal human feelings into guilt, fear, and a lack of understanding of our purpose in this world, as we attempt to deny our true selves.
The confusion doesn’t end there. As Jesus fulfills all his famous prophecies and miracles, he’s put up against results he doesn’t expect. His sermon on the mount ends with the crowd calling for violence. He protects the adulteress (now Mary Magdalene) from a crowd throwing stones, and while he does call out his famous line “May he who is without sin cast the first stone”, he also directly confronts a man who claims to be without sin, to which Jesus swiftly calls out his sins in public. Everything you remember from the bible plays out, but always differently than you remember. Jesus is called to duty by God, but the duty never works out so cleanly, causing Jesus’ feelings of confusion and contempt for his call to be the savior of humanity. Even though in these moments of struggle he can feel God talking through him, he still can’t believe that he is the Messiah. Judas pushes back on this, encouraging him to seek John the Baptist, who may have answers. Jesus confronts an erratic and mangy John, chanting prophecies to audiences of feverish naked followers, bathing and baptizing in the Jordan. This John sounds more like a Pentecostal pastor than he does a soothing Baptist. He sees the divinity in Jesus, but believes that the only way to rid the world of its corruption is to cut it down with an axe, not heal it through the heart. “If I was a woodcutter, I'd cut. If I was a fire, I'd burn. But I'm a heart and I love. That's the only thing I can do.” Jesus responds. But the only way out is through, as this complex whirlwind of emotion comes to an apex, Jesus attempts to face God directly in the desert.
“I'm a liar. A hypocrite. I'm afraid of everything. I don't ever tell the truth. I don't have the courage. When I see a woman, I blush and look away. I want her; but, I take her, for God, and that makes me proud. And then my pride ruins Magdalene. I don't steal. I don't fight. I don't kill. Not because I don't want to but because I'm afraid. I want to rebel against you, against everything, against God! But, I'm afraid. You want to know who my mother and father are? You want to know who my God is? Fear. You look inside me and that's all you'll find.” - Jesus
In what is one of the film’s most famous and visually striking scenes, Jesus enters the desert and binds himself to a circle that he draws in the sand below. In the night, he’s tempted by three separate manifestations of the Devil, who in turn manifest three different temptations that Jesus routinely faces throughout the film. The first is a serpent voiced by Mary Magdalene, representing Jesus’ conflicting feelings of love, lust, and his desire to have a family. After ten days of solitude, Jesus’ hunger withers into the sands, as a lion approaches him with the voice of Judas. He mocks Jesus’ humility. Jesus claims to be holier than thou, yet builds crosses for the Romans. He has immeasurable power given to him by God, yet he chooses not to use it for personal gain. Once again, there is an inner conflict. What he can do versus what he does. It’s a raging storm. Lastly, he‘s approached by Satan, who appears as a flame with an unrecognizable voice. He gives Jesus one last chance to leave, this time ruling by his side as a god with no limitations. No need for all the boundaries and rules set by his Father. Jesus can be who he wants and do what he wants. No strings attached. The flame withers, and a small tree appears with an apple dangling right in front of Jesus. He takes a bite, and blood runs through the core and onto his beard. The flame appears one last time, and Jesus casts him away by throwing the apple at him. Then, at Jesus’ side, an axe appears. God has spoken. It’s time to deliver the message.
The disciples sit around a campfire, losing faith that Jesus might really be the one. In the heat of their debate, Jesus emerges from the shadows. He lets them know that a war is coming. A war for the heart, mind, and spirit. Then, Jesus reaches down into his chest and pulls out his still-beating heart. “This is my heart. Take it. God is inside of us. The Devil is outside, in the world all around us. We’ll pick up an axe and cut the Devil’s throat. We’ll fight him wherever he is. In the sick. In the rich. Even in the temple.” A drop of blood runs down his hand and ripples into the water below, turning it bright red. It’s the complete opposite image we have of Jesus in our minds. Ripping out his heart, holding an axe, and calling for war? It may surprise you, but this isn’t as far out as you might think. The beating heart is a clear nod to the famous Sacred Heart of Jesus painting you can find in the household of any Latino Catholic family. While Scorsese is definitely reinterpreting love for war, the body horror becomes less of a shock when you reference the source material.
Sacred Heart of Jesus Painting
For the aforementioned war part of Jesus’ speech, in Scripture, Jesus is multiple times depicted with a sword, speaking to rage against evil. In Matthew 10:34–36, he directly states, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” Again, in Revelation 19:15, a hazy and psychedelic vision of Jesus appears to John, with a sword coming out of his mouth: “From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.” Not only is a sword mentioned here, but wrath. One of the seven deadly sins. While not an axe, the symbolism is clear. Jesus will uproot the Devil by any means necessary, and he’s not afraid to get violent to do it.
Speaking to the side of Jesus as man, anger is part of what makes us human. For Jesus, this manifests as a rage against evil and those who perpetrate it. Not only does this loop back to Scripture, but also to what is considered the de facto Jesus movie, Pasolini’s The Gospel According to St. Matthew. In the film, Jesus is loving, but he’s also a passionate spirit who is not afraid to lay down the law and get aggressive with transgressors. Pasolini was inspired by Communist leaders of the time, injecting a surprising amount of socialism into him. Despite how politically sensitive this all was (especially during its 1964 release), it garnered the stamp of approval from the big man in the small country. Even with Pasolini identifying as a gay, Communist atheist, the Vatican news outlet L'Osservatore Romano has claimed his film as the best cinematic depiction of the life and times of Jesus Christ, describing it as “a symbol of [Pope] Francis’ merciful Church.” The film was also part of Pope John Paul II’s official Vatican Film List. The Gospel According to St. Matthew was also deeply influential on Scorsese, citing it as a direct inspiration for creating this new, transgressive image of Jesus.
“John was baptized with water and they killed him. Now I baptize with fire.” - Jesus
Jesus brought the axe; now he intends to use it. In what is my favorite scene from the film, Jesus famously goes to a temple to find vendors and sellers turning it into a flea market. He goes into a rage as he flips over tables and scatters people out of the temple until the rabbis come to stop him. He lashes out at them for letting the temple become desecrated, as they try to defend the behavior. They denounce his authority, but Jesus proclaims it. “When I say 'I’ rabbi, I’m saying God… This temple will be destroyed in three days. Torn down to the ground! There won’t be one stone left to build with. You think God only belongs to you?… God is not an Israelite!” It’s pure blasphemy, but Jesus doesn’t care for the gasps. The disciples escort Jesus out, but in three days, they return. Equipped with a literal axe, Jesus has prepped them for war, with many of them expecting to die. Peter even asks, “Will there be angels that will meet us?” Jesus looks at him silently, wraps his arm around him, and they walk. As the drums of Peter Gabriel’s score echo through the screen, a crowd of onlookers grants Jesus his Palm Sunday, as he rides on the back of a donkey, leading armed disciples into the temple. Then the axe comes down. Jesus starts swinging, knocking over everything in sight. He climbs his way to the top of the temple stairs… but he stops. He’s hit with a moment of doubt, “Lord. I hope this is what you want. Let me die here. Let it happen fast while I have the strength.” Suddenly, the riot is swarmed by temple guards surrounding them with spears. All eyes are on Jesus. “They’re waiting for your signal… Do it. Do it now!” they chant. As time nearly seems to freeze, Jesus looks down. “Please, I’m waiting too. Give me the axe, not the cross. Let me die like this.” The center of his palms begin to bleed. The sign is clear. Jesus is paralyzed with fear as the reality sets in, and his army of revolutionaries turns on him.
Judas leads Jesus out to hide in a tunnel for safety, where they have a poignant heart-to-heart. Jesus knows that his destiny now lies on the front of the cross as humanity’s sacrificial lamb, but he can’t do it alone. He tells Judas, “You have to kill me.” But Judas can’t. “If that’s what God wants, let God do it. I won’t.” Calmly and quietly, Jesus tries to bring comfort to his friend. “He will do it, through you.” So much of this film revolves around this reinterpretation of the relationship between Jesus and Judas. Judas is no longer the betrayer, but a bigger part of the plan. A plan that none of them want to partake in but have to nonetheless, because it’s the right thing to do. Life is so rarely about doing what we want, but doing what’s right.
“If you were me could you betray your master?” - Judas
“No, That’s why God gave me the easier job.” - Jesus
The next chunk of the film plays out pretty close to Scripture… until it doesn’t. Jesus and the disciples have the Last Supper. The guards grab Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus talks with Pontius Pilate (played by surprise cameo David Bowie, because why not?). He’s mocked, whipped, carries the cross, and is condemned to die with nails through his palms. That’s all well and good, but that’s not why it’s called the Last Temptation. Laid naked and bare, with a mixture of blood and sweat dripping down his temple, time freezes as Jesus is nailed to the cross. He’s approached by a young girl, claiming to be his guardian angel. She says that God has commanded her to save Jesus from the cross. “Remember when he told Abraham to sacrifice his son? Abraham was just about to kill the boy with his knife when God stopped him. So, if he saved Abraham's son, don't you think he'd want to save his own?” Blasphemy ensues, as Jesus comes down from the cross and embarks on the life he’d always dreamed of living. He settles down with Mary Magdalene, has children, and grows old. As he reaches the last days of his life, Jerusalem comes under attack by the Romans. It’s an apocalyptic nightmare of fire and destruction, turning the sky blood red. As the Romans tear Jerusalem to the ground, Jesus lies on his deathbed. Soon, the front door opens, and pouring through come all twelve apostles, one by one. They chastise Jesus in disappointment for his failure to make the sacrifice on the cross. He pledged himself to the cause, asking for sacrifice from all his supporters, only to leave when the world needed him most. Of course, Judas is the most disappointed. He betrayed Jesus at his behest, led the apostles in the name of Christ, only to be abandoned and betrayed by Jesus himself. It’s a humbling moment for Jesus, as he must confront how his choice rippled throughout the world, past and present. Judas calls out the guardian angel for who she truly is—Satan. The pillar of fire out in the desert. Terrified of his failure, Jesus crawls out of bed and onto a rock atop the burning Jerusalem. He begs God, “I want to bring salvation! Father, take me back! Make a feast! Welcome me home! I want to be your son! I want to pay the price! I want to be crucified and rise again!” The hand of God turns back the clock, and time goes running back as Jesus finds himself once again on the cross. He looks to his right, then his left. He’s seen his place in the world. A smile runs across his face as he shouts, “It is accomplished!” and the literal film inside the camera sputters out as the credits fade in over the whines of Peter Gabriel’s ending score.
“Your place was on the cross. That's where God put you. When death got too close, you got scared and you ran away. And you hid yourself in the life of some man. We did what we were supposed to do! You didn't!… You broke my heart.” - Judas
So, how does one unpack all of this? Within 163 minutes, Scorsese is asking the questions that men of the cloth have been too afraid to pose for the past 2,000 years. We are called not only as Catholics, but people of all religions, to examine the strengths of our own faith. Do we do what we do out of obligation, fear, or the belief in our heart of hearts that it’s the right thing? By using Jesus as the lens to inspect our faith, we can see how even a man considered perfect had to struggle to achieve his goals and do his duty. Scorsese does this by breaking down the idea of Jesus into three identities: the man, the God, and the legend. At its core, the idea is to examine Jesus under this lens of the man, suffering under the pressure of being God, and living up to his prophesied legend. To explore this full potential, these three identities are pitted against each other through Jesus’ inner conflict as a reluctant Messiah.
The film pitches one of its most important spiritual debates during a scene in which, shortly after coming down from the cross, Jesus confronts the street preacher Paul (a former persecutor of Christians, once known by the name of Saul). Paul sings the praises of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Confused and angry, Jesus pulls Paul aside. He tells him to stop spreading lies. He didn’t die on the cross, there was no resurrection, and this story he tells is all lies. Paul responds with “Look around you. Look at all these people. Look at their faces. Do you see how unhappy they are? Do you see how they're suffering? Their only hope is the resurrected Jesus. I don't care whether you're Jesus or not. The resurrected Jesus will save the world, and that's what matters. I created the truth out of what people needed and what they believed. If I have to crucify you to save the world, then I'll crucify you. And if I have to resurrect you, then I'll do that, too.” It might not seem like it, but this is an incredibly loaded statement coming from Scorsese. Does history matter if people believe in a legend? Does Jesus need to be God? Does he even need to be a man who died in the first place? As long as people believe it’s true, they will act in accordance with the word of salvation.
While I’ve generally kept my faith agnostic, I have flirted with the idea that religion was created by man, because the idea that we are all alone on a dirt rock floating through space, where nothing has an ultimate conclusion beyond death, is just too soul-crushing for anybody to accept. That includes all of us. Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, and agnostics. We need the fuel to fire our passion to see tomorrow. It doesn’t matter if Jesus saved the world or if Buddha fell asleep under a tree and achieved Nirvana; what matters is that we have something to hope for in a hopeless world. But I don’t think Scorsese would agree with me on this point because, by the end of the film, the act of sacrifice does matter. The people believe Paul’s story, but destruction still comes to Jerusalem. Without sacrifice, salvation cannot be achieved. While you can easily look at this through the Catholic perspective of salvation through Christ, I see it in a more secular light. Suffering and sacrifice are a part of life. There’s no way of getting around it. It’s something that we as humans have struggled to understand, yet have faced since our inception. Through the story of Jesus (Last Temptation or Biblical), we can understand the purpose of sacrifice in our own lives. If we pretend like it’s not necessary and only live to our selfish wants and desires, we will live to see our world collapse as we die underneath the rubble.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Scorsese almost became a priest, going all the way to preparatory seminary. Those dreams fell through after failing his first year, leaving him unable to achieve the priesthood. Despite sidestepping into the film industry, this lifelong Catholic foundation followed him like it does so many others. In turn, Martin Scorsese directed The Last Temptation as a layered and complex piece of art that could allow him to examine his own faith and the faith of Christians everywhere. In doing that, the film also caused my own conviction of the soul. It didn’t convert me back to my Catholic beliefs, but it helped me reconcile with conflicting ideas that never got the closure I desired. Throughout Catholic teaching, there is a barrier put between you and Christ. You’re constantly told that he is perfect, without flaw, and the holiest of the holy, yet we are still told that he is also man. Every time you try to come close to this human element, there’s another layer of Scripture and holiness designed to block the idea and understanding of who that man is. In the modern age, we often speak of representation in the media. Usually, this comes down to gender or race, but people greatly underestimate the representation of belief, leaders, and iconography. We believe what we see, and when we can’t relate to the image that’s projected, we are taught to either fear or reject it. As an anxiety-riddled kid, plagued with OCD, intrusive thoughts, and the fear of hell and mortal sins wrangled into my brain by less-than-gentle Catholic school teachers, I needed to see a Jesus who had fear, who struggled, and didn’t want to do his duty, but did it anyway because it was the right thing to do. If Jesus is within me, then I need to see it. Through the writings of Kazantzakis, the camera of Scorsese, and the time I’ve had to reflect, I am no longer blinded by those around me. Image is a powerful tool, and if we can only see a Jesus we can’t obtain, he’ll never be within us. I’d be lying if I said I had full closure, but if I did… well then I wouldn’t have grown up Catholic.
“All my life, I've been followed by voices, by footsteps, by shadows. And do you know what that shadow is? The cross. I have to die on the cross, and I have to die willingly.” - Jesus
Passion by Peter Gabriel
One of the great things about Last Temptation is that it exists as a sort of multimedia project. Of course, there’s the book, the movie, but also the score, which developed into an independent project of its own. Composed by progressive-rock musician Peter Gabriel, it’s a transcendental and psychedelic Middle-Eastern drum rock album, that for my money, is one of the finest film scores ever written. Throwing us in the midst of the same temptation and crisis as Jesus, the thunderous drums and psychedelic chants invoke the devastation and triumph that Jesus feels so thoroughly in the film. Appropriately opening with “The Feeling Begins”, wind instruments carry the listener to the Moroccan desert plains where the film was photographed. Bassy drums layer the score, with higher percussion surrounding the listener in what becomes an overwhelming sensation of mental stimulation, mirroring Jesus facing the thunderous sound of God commanding his death on the cross. The album shifts into haunting atmospheric pieces like “In Doubt” and “Stigmata”; while “With This Love” (and its choir reprise) brings a welcoming feeling of hope and simultaneous melancholy. The three most famous pieces from the album, “Passion”, “A Different Drum”, and “It Is Accomplished’ do a lot of heavy lifting to communicate many of the film’s thematic elements through feeling and song. “Passion” appropriately scores the lead-up to Jesus’ crucifixion, as he stumbles to carry the cross to Golgotha Hill to be crucified. Steady wind instruments are underscored by thicker horns that sound like cries of pain, while literal cries of pain come from vocal chants, creating a beautiful seven-minute-long epic of passion, pain, and sacrifice, as the cries of angels sing and guitars shred to the horrors below. It’s a tone-setter for one of the greatest sacrifices ever made and the soundtrack for the shedding of humanity for the death of its savior. ”A Different Drum” comes from the complete opposite side, as an ‘80s rock-inspired, Middle-Eastern chant anthem. Scoring the lead-up to Jesus’ army coming to destroy the temple, Peter Gabriel’s thick vocal war chants overlay rhythmic Middle-Eastern drums to create an intense and energetic atmosphere. Following this 80s rock beat, “It Is Accomplished” ends the film, starting with the eerie sound of what can only be described as birdlike voices crying out into the distance, only to tone-switch into the triumphant energy of church bells and electric guitar for a triumphant rock ballad. Without words, it communicates the horrific death on the cross, followed by the joyful resurrection to come. Admittedly, these last two tracks can be a bit painfully ‘80s at times. You can definitely hear the sounds of Genesis in this album, as remnants of Gabriel’s time with the band infuse nearly every track. Hell, at times it feels like Phil Collins is going to burst into song with the Middle-Eastern choir. But once you get used to its unique style, the album reveals itself as a fantastic companion piece to the film and a career-high for Peter Gabriel. In many ways, it sounds like a proto-Dune score, inspiring what Hans Zimmer would do later with Villeneuve’s similar sand-setting messiah story.
While the sound of the album is incredibly distinct, what immediately sticks out is the album art. Originally created by artist Julian Grater, this piece was part of a series of textured and atmospheric mixed-media self-portraits created from charcoal, graphite, paste, acrylic, bitumen, beeswax, dry pigment, straw, and flower petals. It went by the title of Drawing Study for Self Image II. Despite not being created for the film, the piece stood out to Gabriel and Scorsese for its heavy tone and atmosphere, while also painting an unintended resemblance to Jesus, particularly with the stick looking like the crown of thorns. The cover art is arguably my favorite part of the album, as it manages to convey the entirety of the film in a single image. I loved it so much that I made it my new phone wallpaper after using the same lock screen for the past eight years. It’s a fitting bow that ties this psychedelic Jesus art project all together.
“It is accomplished! It is accomplished…” - Jesus
Of all my reviews, I’d be lying if I said this wasn’t a strange one. Here I am as a heathen, speaking the praises of a Jesus movie. It just goes to show the power of storytelling. It’s a tool that we use to share our history and fuel our fire. Through it, we can understand ourselves, our world, and our faith. Despite the fact that I remain wholly agnostic by the end of all this, I believe faith doesn’t need to be tied to religion, but rather tied to the morals that we believe in to see tomorrow. A small part of me dies when I look out my window or turn on the news, and I see how much needless suffering exists. It’s in these moments that I look towards my own faith within myself and humanity. Through our ability to both anger and love, we can create a better world for ourselves and our children. Slowly but surely, the Christian world seems like it’s starting to come around to these ideals. While, unfortunately, Kazantzakis couldn’t live to see it, I’m sure he’d be proud of what his work left behind. Honestly, it doesn't get more Jesus than that.
From the Wikipedia page of Niko Kazantzakis Kazantzakis died on October 26th, 1957, in Freiburg, Germany, at age 74. He is buried at the highest point of the Walls of Heraklion, the Martinengo Bastion, looking out over the mountains and sea of Crete. His epitaph reads "I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free."
